ASEAN sceptics versus ASEAN proponents: evaluating regional institutions

Abstract

Since it was founded in 1967, the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) has attracted both sceptics and proponents. With Southeast Asia’s economy growing rapidly and tied into all parts of the global economy and the region geopolitically important to the world’s major powers, how ASEAN manages its internal affairs and East Asian relations is crucial. The differences in how sceptics and proponents perceive ASEAN, and why they take up such contrasting positions, need to be fully appreciated as scholars and commentators review and assess ASEAN’s performance. This analysis uses three analytical criteria – effectiveness, legitimacy and efficiency – to juxtapose and evaluate the competing arguments of the two approaches so as to better understand how and why sceptics and proponents can examine the same institutions and events and reach very different conclusions.

Keywords:

• ASEAN Sceptics
• ASEAN proponents
• effectiveness
• legitimacy
• efficiency
• ASEAN

Acknowledgements

I would like to thank the editors and the anonymous reviewers as well as David Camroux, Sorpong Peou, Grace Skogstad and Luk Van Langenhove for their constructive comments. Obviously, I am responsible for any errors in fact or judgement.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes on contributor

Richard Stubbs is Professor Emeritus in the Department of Political Science, McMaster University, Canada. He has published widely on the state in East and Southeast Asia as well as on the international political economy and security of the Asia-Pacific region. His latest book it is Rethinking Asia’s Economic Miracle: The Political Economy of War, Prosperity and Crisis, 2nd Edition (London: Palgrave, 2018). He is currently working on a research project on comparative regionalism funded by the Social Science and Humanities Research Council of Canada (435-2015-1357).

Notes

1 ASEAN original members were Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore and Thailand. They were joined by Brunei in 1984, Vietnam in 1995, Burma/Myanmar and Laos in 1997 and Cambodia in 1999.